I have a Win 7 machine in the bedroom that only operates as a DVR. Some time ago, the large (4TB) secondary storage drive accidentally (yes, accidentally) got converted to GPT. It was shut down immediately and has not been turned on since. I'd like to see if there is a way to change it back to MBR to save all the recordings on it.

Any way to do that?

Otherwise, I'll just have a lot more space to record on I guess.

Yes, without data loss.

Use EaseUS (It's similar to Partition Magic and other disk utilities. I've used it on thousands of drives over the years.)

https://www.easeus.com/partiti...isk-to-mbr-disk.html

Too cool.

Thanks, Monkey!

Wouldn’t you have to have GPT to see all 4 TB?

How did converting to GPT loose data if it did?

Normally using a drive partition table (GPT) vs master boot record (MBR) is determined during drive initialization.

MBR is used for disks 2TB or less.
GPT for the drives in any size.
GPT is particularly relevant for boot drives and UEFI.

A computer can have both MBR and GPT but must be on independent drives.

A MBR ~ legacy boot drive can have a GPT secondary drive and especially when needed is large partitions.

There are some limitations with 32bit OS though.

https://www.diskpart.com/gpt-m...-same-disk-7201.html

Wait…it got ‘converted’ and you lost the data on it? That sounds a lot like the drive got reformatted. If that is the case, converting to MBR isn’t going to restore the lost info about where files were on the disk. You might be looking for a tool to scan the empty space looking for files rather than trying to change from GPT to MBR.

GPT and MBR, to simplify things, split a drive up into different segments called partitions. They do t track individual files. Generally, a partition will get formatted with a file system like FAT32 or NTFS, which is what keeps track of where exactly on the disk a file is stored. Because of this, I’m not super-confident that switching back to MBR is going to solve your problem.

- Bret

Magna I can't sleep at night wondering what the status is. Turn that PC on and let's take some screenshots of disk manager, etc.!

Like Sadler said, I kind of think you formatted the drive. Before this "accident" happened - how many partitions were there and what were the sizes?